Scallop enhancement is a form of aquaculture that uses the sea bottom to
grow out seeded juvenile scallops to commercial size for harvesting. Pecten
UPM/MFU Inc., an organization dedicated to scallop enhancement, seeded 76
million scallops over three sites in the Gulf of St. Lawrence (New Brunswick)
between 1999 and 2004, at a rate of roughly 1km2 per site per year (Fig.1). It
has been suggested that a recuperation rate greater than 25% is needed for
economic viability of such an enhancement venture (Hébert and Nadeau, 2002).
Well below this target value, the recuperation rate for one of the Pecten sites was
recently estimated at only 8% (according to video surveys). Low recuperation
rates can result from many factors such as dispersal, predation, and handling
mortalities.